School Holiday Fun and Research

May 11, 2015 in Research, Inspiration

I am blessed in my little boy for many reasons, but at school holiday time one reason comes in very handy.

“Mummy I love nature. It’s just so full of beautiful stuff!
”

— O. Gillard 2015

It is becoming our tradition every school Holidays to get out into our local bushlands and gardens. He loves it, we are both getting excercise and I can work as well.

This holidays we climbed Mt Majura and took the forest walk on Black Mountain. We were going to do some further exploring at the National Botanic Gardens but they were closed the day we went due to extremely windy conditions. Much to our disappointment; my son really wanted to visit the new desert garden.

Mt Majura Nature Reserve

Mt Majura is right behind where we live so we visit there quite often. I plan to climb it every school holiday break this year so I can take note of the seasonal changes and know what is in flower when. I like the idea of painting the flowers and plants that are close to where I live. It is easy to be seduced by the rarity and diversity of the Australian flora when visiting the collection of plants at the National Botanic gardens, and I do get a chance to explore those plants when I paint with the Freinds of the Botanic Gardens group but I really want to concentrate on those specimens close to home first.

On this visit there was not a great deal in flower, it is starting to cool off heading towards winter.

Heading off.

Canberra city through the trees, Black Mountain and Telstra Tower visible. Autumn colours just starting to come through.

Allocasuarine verticillata, Drooping She-Oak

Allocasuarine verticillata, Drooping She-Oak- close up of the seed pod.

A ringlet of peeled bark.

Short kip in the tree before we head for home.

Black Mountain

I have lived in canberra for 20 years since coming here as a University student. I have visited the tower on black mountain but had never explored the surrounding bush. So when we visited the National Botanic gardens to find it closed we decided to explore Black Mountain which is right next door to the gardens.

We followed the forest walk trail which takes about an hour to walk and takes you right around the top half of the mountain. It is a rugged little landscape, that floats quietly above the bustle of Canberra city.

Black Mountain map showing the forest walk trail.

Canberra icon, Telstra tower.

Spot the wallaby.

There are tonnes of huge termite mounds.

Fungus

Spot the red breasted robin. (wishing I'd brought my big camera lense!)

In his natural habitat.

There has been recent hazzard reduction burns over Black mountain so from the ashes, heaps of little seedlings were starting to appear.

Mini-break Weekend to one of my Favourite Destinations.

November 25, 2014 in Flowers, Research, Inspiration

There's nothing like a weekend away to recharge the batteries. My folks live in a lovely rural area in the Upper Murray and it is one of my favourite places. For me it is a place rich with inspiration on many levels, the wonderful location and surrounding countryside, the garden which is full of native plants and the house which is full of bits of history.

The Home.

The homestead.

Pieces of history- A reconditioned gas light.

Ancestors.

Some most terrific objects.

More beautiful things.

A great place to be a kid.

A great place to tucker out the kid!

The Homestead, built in the early 2000's is Mud brick, built with mud from the site, recycled building materials, including all the doors and windows, even the staircase. A place full of rich colours and textures which only age can procure, it has all the wonder of a museum without the 'Do not Touch' signs.

“If the furniture of our houses could last an age or two, what notions of our fortitude must posterity have!
In the scenes of our domestic privacy and retirement, we keep our energies awake by surrounding ourselves with the most terrific objects!”

— The Sydney Gazzette, 1812

The Garden.

Brachychiton Populneus

The Kurrajong is native to the area.

Tristania conferta

Brush Box

Pandorea.

Pod.

Pandorea.

Grevillea robusta.

Silky Oak.

Grevillea robusta.

Pods.

For me the garden is a wonderful resource for painting and drawing. Every time I visit there is something different in flower. The bird life is prolific including Eastern spinebills, Blue Wrens, several varieties of Honeyeaters and Parots. On this visit it was a joy to watch the Rainbow Bee Eaters at dusk cruising around but I may have to improve my bird photography skills to capture some good images.

Colours from Nature.

October 28, 2014 in Research, Textiles, Natural Dyes

More fun with Natural Dyes.

A continuation of experiments with natural dyestuffs this time adding some different mordants to see how the colours are affected.

The set up.

Some materials.

Boiling up red onions.

Wattle leaves.

Acacia cultriformis, knifed leafed wattle

Pole Wrapping.

Pole wrapping is bassically a length of fabric that is bound around a pole and dyed to give different effects. You will get some areas where the dye does not penetrate the fabric as much creating random patterns. For this wrap experiment I took a length of handwoven fabric, woven in cotton and wool. Wool takes up the natural dyes much more readily than the cotton. It was laid out and I scattered an assortment of leaves and flowers over the top and then rolled it up around a length of dowel. It was then bound tightly with string.

Pole wrapping.

Showing the fabric and leaves before it is bound around a pole with string and put into a dyebath.

Dyebath.

Unfortunately we did not have a giant pot so I had to keep turning it every so often.

Unbinding.

After the dyebath in which it simmered for about an hour it was wrapped in plasitic and left in the sun for a couple of days.

The back.

You can see how the cotton did not take up the dye.

Finished.

This is one end of the fabric, the bindings made beautiful marks as did the leaves.